NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING SERIES • This wicked novel uncovers the origins of one of Disney’s most cold-hearted villains: Cinderella’s stepmother, Lady Tremaine.

This was supposed to be her happily ever after...

It’s a familiar tale: A kind and beautiful young girl, reeling from loss. A doting father, frantic to bring a mother’s love back into his daughter’s life. And the selfish, cruel woman who insinuates herself into that family, a woman so unfeeling, so cold hearted, that when her new husband dies, she makes the girl a servant in her own home.

But who is that evil stepmother, that icy lady of the house? How did she become so closed off that, in the face of a child’s grief, she thought only to seek wealth and power for herself and her abhorrent daughters? Before that fateful ball, before the glass slipper and the prince, there was another story, a story of love and grief, of hope and of dreams dashed. It is the story of Lady Tremaine.